Oracle Wins Partial Verdict in Google Trial

SAN FRANCISCO (CN) – The operating system for the Google Android infringes on Oracle’s Java copyrights, a federal jury ruled in the first phase of a three-part trial Monday morning. The partial verdict, which Google already claims is the product of a mistrial, is a mixed bag for both companies. After allegations of possible juror misconduct were put to rest minutes before, the jury came back into the U.S. District Judge William Alsup’s courtroom apparently ready to move on to Phase II of the landmark copyright and patent infringement trial. Jurors were unanimous that Google infringed the overall structure, sequence and organization of the Oracle’s 37 Java Application Programming Interfaces (API ) packages, but were unable to reach a verdict on whether Google proved that its use of the API packages in its Android system constituted fair use. The jury found that Oracle did not prove that Google copied the documentation for the 37 APIs, and also found that Google’s use of source code eight files and the English-language comments in two other files were not infringement. Google did violate Oracle’s copyright on the range-check function, which had nine lines of code identical to that of Java. Google lawyer Robert Van Nest frequently referred to it as “nine lines out of 16,000.” While the jury found that Google proved Sun Microsystems, Oracle’s predecessor, may have done or said things that led Google to believe it didn’t need a license to use the Java files, Google failed to prove that it relied on Sun or Oracle’s conduct in deciding to use the files. Van Nest promised a written motion for a mistrial of the entire first question on the jury’s verdict form for Tuesday morning, with Oracle’s attorney Michael Jacobs poised to deliver a response on Wednesday morning. In the meantime, Alsup jumped right into the second phase – patent infringements – with the same jury, and both sides promising many of the same witnesses as in the copyright portion of the trial.